Living and Dying on the Internet

Commentary
Title:	Living and Dying on the Internet
Commentator:	Alex Day
Date(s):	5 August 2018
Medium:	Book
Fandom:	YouTube RPF, Nerdfighteria Doctor Who, Harry Potter
External Links:	https://archive.org/details/living-and-dying-on-the-internet
Click here for related articles on Fanlore.

Living and Dying on the Internet is a 2018 memoir by British YouTuber and accused predator Alex Day about his time in the YouTube community in its early days, his involvement in fannish communities, and his eventual downfall in 2014 during a wave of allegations regarding sexual misconduct of YouTubers. In the realm of fandom, Day is notable for his contributions to filk-- notably having been member of the trock band Chameleon Circuit and having contributed to wizard rock (specifically helping with The Parselmouths' third album). During this time, he was associated with the online Nerdfighter community.

Summary

'Sorry, ' she said, 'it's just I've never met anyone famous before.'

'Sorry, ' I replied, 'you still haven't.'

In 2008, the media reported that Alex Day was the first person in the UK to make money from YouTube videos. He was described as 'a YouTube star'. But he didn't feel like one.

Alex watched as his channel grew, leading him to a YouTube party in Sydney, a video convention in Los Angeles and a world record attempt in London. He signed up to new sites like Facebook, Twitter and Tumblr. But as his professional life flourished, his personal life unravelled when a series of damning blog posts exposed his past and left him with no friends and no home -- and no audience.

How would you cope if your worst mistakes were written up and torn apart by thousands of strangers, right before your eyes? A book about ambition, failure and responsibility, Living and Dying on the Internet is a timely and unparalleled look into the evolution of YouTube, the culture of public shaming and an insightful account of how the internet has changed -- and changed us -- over the last ten years.

Quotes

Note: When referring to former collaborator Charlotte McDonnell (Charlieissocoollike), Day refers to her using he/him pronouns. A few years after this book's publication, Charlotte came out of the closet as a transgender woman. These quotes referring to McDonnell are left as they appear in the book.

The vlogbrothers channel, I later learned, was a collaborative project

between two brothers, John and Hank, who made video messages back and forth every weekday for the whole of 2007. Theirs was the first ‘collab channel’ on YouTube. The goal of the project, which they called Brotherhood 2.0, was to foster a more genuine brotherhood between the two by ceasing all text-based communication for a year — no emails, texts or Facebook messages — and conversing instead through daily vlogs. They built an audience by exhibiting their natural passions for knowledge, particularly science and literature; Hank was an environmental tech blogger and John was an author of two young adult books. Charlie, I think, felt an affinity with Hank’s goofiness, hyper-verbal songwriting and love of science. I became more inspired by John, who seemed more charming, with a deadpan sense of humour and an intense passion for his art.

John and Hank called their viewers ‘Nerdfighters’, not in the sense of fighting nerds, but fighting for nerds (as in ‘freedom fighters’). They encouraged viewers to ‘imagine people complexly’ and their rallying cry was ‘Don’t forget to be awesome,’ most commonly stated as “DFTBA!” The vlogbrothers blew up when Hank, in anticipation of the final Harry Potter book being released, wrote and uploaded the song ‘Accio Deathly Hallows’. The silver claw of destiny closed around his video; ‘Accio Deathly Hallows’ was featured on the front page of YouTube, plucking John and Hank from online obscurity and dumping them into the public hurricane of veneration and bile.

Five teenage girls were inspired by the vlogbrothers to start a collab channel of their own called ‘fiveawesomegirls’. Like John and Hank, they were fans of Harry Potter and a related movement called ‘wizard rock’ made up of bands with names like Harry and the Potters, The Butterbeer Experience, and Oliver Wood and the Remembralls who wrote and performed songs about the stories. Charlie and I couldn’t resist starting the fiveawesomeguys channel a few weeks later, joining forces with two

Americans — Alan and Todd — and a northern boy, ‘JohnnyDurham19’.

Alex Day, Living and Dying on the Internet https://archive.org/details/living-and-dying-on-the-internet

I loved Charlie, but don’t think I’d have got on with his on-camera persona, who was more like a peppy school teacher, the sort of person I’d expect to find wearing a propeller beanie hat. I don’t think he’d have got on with ‘Nerimon’ either, who I played up as a snobby and sarcastic character.

Our online personas weren’t false, but they were only one facet of our

real selves. The real Charlie was quieter and more mischievous; when I asked him if Bath had a bus service, he almost had me convinced they ride around the town on rented tricycles until I saw his bashful smile.

Alex Day, Living and Dying on the Internet https://archive.org/details/living-and-dying-on-the-internet

Charlie had also uploaded a song called ‘Blink’ about his favourite

Doctor Who episode of the same name. It got me thinking. The Nerdfighters shared a love of the ‘wizard rock’ bands who sang about Harry Potter; I’d thought of doing the same but I didn’t want to be just another Harry Potter band. Charlie’s song gave me the idea to start a band of our own doing songs about Doctor Who, ensuring we could be the start of something new. Not ever doing things by halves, I then made a video saying with my usual humility that I had ‘just invented a new genre of music’ and was creating the founding band of a new musical concept called Time Lord Rock, or ‘Trock’. That’s right: a new musical concept...

Along with Charlie (who jumped on board as soon as I told him the idea), we also recruited our friend Liam, the kid I'd called my kindred spirit back in Glasgow. We figured his striking resemblance to a young David Tennant would be a useful ingredient in our band; we neither knew nor cared whether he had any musical capability. Liam shared the news with a friend of his we all knew as Ginger Chris, who seemed offended. ‘Why didn’t you ask me to be in the band?’ said Ginger Chris. ‘I didn’t know you liked Doctor Who,’ I said. ‘I love it!’ ‘Oh, okay,’ I said. ‘Yeah, be in it then.’

Together, we called ourselves Chameleon Circuit.

Alex Day, Living and Dying on the Internet https://archive.org/details/living-and-dying-on-the-internet

...writing music with Denise for her wizard rock band The Parselmouths (rated ‘third best wizard rock band of 2007’ by MTV). I helped write and perform some of the tracks for their new albumSpattergroit and flew to Boston for its launch at a

Harry Potter convention called LeakyCon. I’d never experienced an event like it: a cross between a concert, a conference and a fancy-dress party, lasting for two full days and nights. with thousands of kids running around all weekend adorned with scarves and wands, taking pictures underneath huge banners of each of the four Hogwarts houses. The vlogbrothers, Hank and John, came to town for LeakyCon and Denise told me the fiveawesomegirls thought of John as their adopted father. (I’d had a Skype call with him before we started seeing each other to make sure he approved of us dating.)

‘Oh my god!’ Denise said at her phone when we arrived, unleashing a fit of giggles. ‘Look at this tweet.’ I leaned in. Denise had announced her arrival at the event and John tweeted her (and the world): ‘Daddy’s here. Where’s the party?’

‘Daddy’s here, where’s the party?!’ I grinned at him when I saw him.

‘I know,’ said John, dismayed. ‘I judged that poorly. I’ve already heard a lot about this.’

I hadn’t done a gig since my nan watched me in the pub, and this time hundreds of people would be watching. To muster the energy and swagger I needed, I practiced by hunting down live Green Day shows on YouTube, learning from their relentless engagement with the crowd. On the night of the show, I puffed out my chest and pushed back my shoulders, parading around the stage. It turned out doing the gig was as easy as making a YouTube video; just like my videos, I played up a crystallised facet of myself, distilled and projected to the waiting crowd.

After we played our show, we rocked out to The Remus Lupins, led by Shane, the most charismatic man I’ve ever met. Unlike me, wearing charisma like a mask when I needed it, Shane was a fireball on- and offstage, playful and charming and full of energy. He knew how to work a crowd and get them singing along to his songs, even when (like me) they’d never heard them before. He ended his show ― of Harry Potter songs, I’ll remind you ― by holding his guitar aloft like he was posing for a statue, then setting it on fire, then smashing it to pieces.

For the finale of the night, Harry and the Potters — the founders of wizard rock — tore up the stage, slamming their guitars like punk rockers, jumping up and down and leading a wave of claps and cheers, both dressed as Harry Potter, and the crowd screamed like they’d seen a herald of the end of days. At the end of their last song ‘The Weapon’, they cut their instruments and led the crowd to join them in singing their final refrain: ‘The weapon we have is love.’ We repeated it, a cappella, over and over again. I’ve never had any purer image of online communities than that of people singing that their greatest weapon is love, dressed as magical schoolchildren.

The show had me pumped to get Chameleon Circuit's album finished no matter what. I’d generated a lot of hype about the musical phenomenon that was Trock and, try as I might, I’d grown to accept you can’t have a musical phenomenon without actual music. I listened through our patchwork album again. I would have loved it to be honed and fine-tuned but nothing would ever get done if we spent all our time perfecting it first. The album was messy but listenable (with only Charlie’s ‘Friends of the Ood’ unrecorded, bar an acoustic demo), so I told the band we should release the album as it was. This sent shockwaves (or, dare I say,

Trockwaves) through the band, most of all in the loss of Ginger Chris, who wasn’t willing to stand by as our audience heard unfinished versions of his work.

Alex Day, Living and Dying on the Internet https://dn720003.ca.archive.org/0/items/living-and-dying-on-the-internet/Day%2C%20Alex%20-%20Living%20and%20Dying%20on%20the%20Internet.pdf

Signing with DFTBA ensured our success was as important to Hank as

it was to us, so we got promotional videos about Chameleon Circuit from Hank and John on the vlogbrothers channel. For my part, I did what I do best; I pushed aside all the important things in my life to pursue a singleminded focus on what I wanted. I sent an email to Doctor Who Magazine and nabbed an interview by a journalist there called Ben; we got a full page about Chameleon Circuit in the following issue. Prompted by my emails, WIRED, Den of Geek and Digital Spy all wrote about us and reviewed our album, which led to other articles from related sites. My audience played a role, too, without me even having to ask; when the current Doctor, David Tennant, took questions on national radio, an American girl rang in and asked what he thought of Chameleon Circuit and Time Lord Rock. ‘Oh, I have heard of this! They’re quite good aren’t they?’ he gushed, and then

badgered the radio host into playing our music on-air. ‘It’s like proper decent music,’ he insisted to the resistant DJ.

Alex Day, Living and Dying on the Internet https://archive.org/details/living-and-dying-on-the-internet

On balance, if I could start from scratch, I’d pick the internet again. It

enables anyone to choose what they want to do with their life — anything in the world — and can help them start doing it. Of course, that rabbit hole is also the dangerous thing about it. I recently saw an ad on YouTube that said, ‘Your screen is your window to the world’ and I thought, No. My window is my window to the world.

I first went on the internet all those years ago because it helped me connect with people, and now I come off it for the same reason. My only lasting hangup is that whenever I see a teenage girl with dyed hair or a Gryffindor scarf I assume she hates me, and even that is fading. But although it’s tempting to imagine what life would be like if we put the genie back in the bottle — if we were a little less distracted, a little less reactive and a little more aware — the tech’s out there now. This is the world we

have. And I’m glad I get to live in it.

Alex Day, Living and Dying on the Internet https://archive.org/details/living-and-dying-on-the-internet

Reception

Negative

Many found Day's book to be distasteful and accused him of playing the victim, which they took as an indication that he had not learned from his previous actions.

This book has been leaked in some circles - and honestly, it’s exactly what everyone feared. Manipulative and beyond narcissistic. It basically confirms the characteristics of an abuser that everyone has highlighted. Read it if you want that confirmation, but be warned, it’s frustrating as hell and actually terribly written (unsurprisingly!)

T, 25 July 2018 https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/40714110-living-and-dying-on-the-internet

Everything about this book is horrific and there are many reasons why no publisher would touch it. The abuser who wrote the book paints himself as a victim because his career went down the drain when his fans found out that he had been abusing multiple women, several of whom were young (in some cases underage) fans he used his position of influence to take advantage of. The author is scum and is now trying to profit off the stories of the young women whose lives he damaged irreperably. No one should buy this book.

Sal, 25 July 2018 https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/40714110-living-and-dying-on-the-internet

I have never before written a review for a book I haven’t read but I felt strongly in this. This man abused a number of women, continues to disregard their wishes, even in writing this.

The premise could be interesting but I strongly oppose an abuser making money. I would hope the place he would pick to tell his story is in a mental health professionals office or in a rehabilitation group for his pattern of emotionally, physically and sexually abusing women. Not in a book intended for profit. Not in an effort to respark his former glory. Not in this way on this platform. Inappropriate. And to disregard a former partners wishes not be included is an example of all he hasn’t learned. I don’t need, nor do I think anyone need read, hundreds of pages excusing what he refuses to learn; women are people deserving of respect and whose boundaries deserve to be honored, being a part of a community online or otherwise is a privilege, and he was not traumatically cast out arbitrarily. He earned every part of his removal from ‘YouTube fame’ by actively causing harm, dismissing it, and now attempting to profit from it.

A one star rating in my book means I believe it to be actively harmful and discourage the reading of it. So wholeheartedly I declare, one star for Alex Day.

NOTE: I went to amazon to post a similar warning in light of how Alex responds to these concerns as helping him and couldn’t because it’s not out. So I emailed amazon the following concern, and if you’re bothered by this too, I encourage you to do the same. One voice may not make the biggest difference but many of our voices might. I’m including that letter below please feel free to take any parts and use them to share your concern with Amazon:

Hello I hope this email finds you well. I’m writing because a book is being sold on here by a known public abuser, Alex Day. He manipulated, assaulted, cheated on, emotionally abused many women. He’s now releasing a book.

I admit I’m torn. On one hand I don’t believe in censorship and if that’s true there should be no complaint or reason to write this but on the other I’m deeply moved to pose the question, does every story need to be told, or worse, sold? Should he profit from this harm? He has his story yes but does it need to be so easily accessible. He’s shared content from the book online and still manages to twist the story into his sob story, reopening the traumas he has inflicted. It doesn’t seem right.

He discusses intent and how his intent wasn’t to harm. But if my intent was to have a pleasant indoor bonfire and burnt a house down wouldn’t I still be at fault? What if someone died in that fire? Wouldn’t my impact of life lost mean more than my intent? What if it was dozens or hundreds of people who had died? Is my intent enough to atone my impact?

To me the answer is no. In the same way Alex Days living and dying on the Internet book is his open discussion of how he meant for a nice indoor bon fire retelling of his glory days disregarding the lives he burned, the community he hurt, and the damage created by reopening this.

I urge you to consider these questions and think carefully about allowing this abusive man to profit from the horrific things he has done. Offer a flag option, or, ideally, remove it.

Sincerely,

Chrissy Hollermann

Chrissy, 5 August 2018 https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/40714110-living-and-dying-on-the-internet

what i can say except you are piece of shit who sees women as meat and don't deserve my understanding or compassion i feel sorry for myself to even read this and wasted three hours reading it

Ina Cawl, 7 August 2018 https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/40714110-living-and-dying-on-the-internet

I'm not a fan of Alex, in part because of the allegations against him, but I still was intrigued by this book and gave it an objective read.

There's no doubt that Alex can actually write - this, especially in comparison to most other YouTubers' books, is well written and engaging. It seems thoughtful at first as well - the parts about his childhood, growing up, how he got into YouTube and the rise of YouTube and the internet are genuinely very interesting, as are the backstories to a lot of his singles and the campaigns around them.

The problems start when he starts talking about the scandal surrounding him. While it's interesting to hear his side of the story, he clearly still views himself as a victim and in my opinion, his manipulative behaviour is still on show in a few ways. First of all, he does frequently invalidate the opposing stories. Even as he says that allegations should be taken seriously and that he's against victim blaming, he still manages to have an explanation for every single thing that he did wrong. He DID coerce "Penny" and made her feel uncomfortable and yet he still emphasises that she "led him on" in an email and that he was "trying to make her feel better" and reiterates this in the book even as she points out that she's allowed to change her mind and that she wasn't interested.

While some of the allegations are, according to the evidence he presents in his book, exaggerated or made up, that doesn't invalidate everyone as a whole. Even the people that he admits are right - such as "Marilyn" being upset about him cheating - he still goes out of his way to paint her as insecure, overemotional and implies that she only left him because of public perception. Whether or not this is the case, that's not a character flaw on her behalf and does nothing to change the fact that he was, inherently, in the wrong.

I also felt that some of his later points had value but he immediately ruined them. For example, he goes on a rant about how easily "triggered" people are and that they can't expect the internet to cater to them while a few sentences later saying that he contacted Google and asked them to remove all the allegations against him. He also makes good points about online public humiliation and retaliation, which I do agree with, but then he goes on to say that #MeToo is overblown and uses Bill Cosby as an example of his trial.

Alex's point is that due to media coverage, Bill Cosby cannot get a fair trial because there won't be any unbiased witnesses. However, if it wasn't for that coverage than Cosby wouldn't have had a trial at all - it was known that he did this to women but never taken seriously until it was so far in public view that there was no choice. Whenever he has the seed of a good point, he goes too far in the other direction and I got the sense that he was only making this points in order to justify his own behaviour.

He also talks later about how his friends "ghosted" him after the allegations came out, and once again portrays himself as a victim. It's interesting, because at the end he says that his first and second drafts weren't great because he didn't show any growth and people didn't feel any sympathy for him, but I had the same response to this one - he didn't grow, and it all felt like an elaborate justification on why he should be forgiven and allowed to live his life without people making judgements on his past behaviour. He uses the analogy of a banana being green so you don't eat it, but if you return to it, the banana will have softened and changed.

But Alex isn't a banana, and people are entirely within their rights to not want to talk to him or spend time with him because of his past behaviour. I get the impression that because his past wasn't as bad as some others - there was no outright assault, for example - he believes that he's entitled to forgiveness. He seems to always think that he's right, and doesn't take into consideration that people can make their own decisions and he's not owed anything from them.

All in all, I'm rating it two stars - I feel that there's a star because it is well written and it's an engaging book, but I didn't enjoy it and I disagree with the content and his perspective.

Grace Blaise, 10 August 2018 https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/40714110-living-and-dying-on-the-internet

I'm going to preface this by saying I have indeed read the book. Many people are assuming I am writing a negative review having not read it. I slogged through it.

I'm deleting most of my review because it's causing more harm than good, which is exactly what I feared in this coming out at all. I don't want to talk about Alex. I don't need more people tearing me down because they are Alex fans and don't truly understand what happened. I'm irritated he put me in his book without giving me a heads up. And sure, he can tell his story I guess, he has the right - but this book has an incredible amount of intimate details of a time so, so many of us have spent the last 5 years trying to forget. It doesn't feel good to see a person who betrayed my trust and friendship waxing poetic about how much fun we used to have. What that tells me, honestly, it that he hasn't truly learned much. I don't want to be a part of this anymore, but I wasn't given the choice.

The thinly veiled attempt at hiding our identities, while not bothering to change the names of our bands and our YouTube channels or our cities, is lazy and frustrating. So sure, read it. Think he's changed. I just... don't agree.

Kristina Horner, 14 August 2018 https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/40714110-living-and-dying-on-the-internet

Alex Day's mission statement for this book was that it was going to be the story of his own experiences but more generally a sort of memoir of the internet as a whole and the corner of it that he inhabited for his many years on Youtube. These kind of quasi-memoirs have worked well in the past, I particularly enjoyed recently reading journalist Scott Stossel's work My Age of Anxiety where he blended his own experiences of crippling anxiety through his life with scientific theories about the causes and treatments of mental illness. However, Day's book really never follows through on this same promise.

In the initial chapters Day charts the rise of Youtube from a small video sharing website with small, odd and charming communities to a growing and out of control behemoth. Later in the book he weighs in on the impact of Twitter hashtags such as the MeToo movement and the growth of the court of public opinion through sites such as Tumblr which vilified him for accusations of sexual/emotional manipulation and faced slanderous accusations of him being a 'rapist' or 'targeting young girls'. But Day fails to really generate anything interesting or thought provoking ideas from these things beyond the purely pedestrian - In early chapters he writes about the realisation that his hurtful comments online could hurt real people in a somewhat hackneyed conclusion to a chapter. His comments on the loss of his audience and having his statements online constantly met social media backlash really amount to nothing more than saying that people should be more forgiving and that it is unfair people should be permanently defined by their mistakes - Which may be true but Day sees no need to drill into this issue any further or consider climate that gave rise to this or even the perspective of his naysayers. They are only ever characterised as an angry mob led by familiar faces of former friends baying for his blood.

The whole middle section of the book is really lacking in analysis of how the internet was changing or evolving and really just tells the story of his various different ventures: Sons of Admirals, Chartjackers, his various attempts to get to number one. In places this provides some interesting glances behind the curtain of what was going on in Youtube or what YT personalities are like when the cameras are turned off - but these are surprisingly limited. Instead you have Day describing in text things that you have already heard him vlog about the first time around and it all seems oddly pointless. Day also veers between a determination to seem like a guy messing about on a laptop who didn't care about fame as showcased by the quote on the book's publicity but a consistent desire to appear as a trailblazer repeatedly emphasising his role in making Youtube what it became.

The other main motivation for reading this book is to see Day address the scandal that brought down his Youtube career surrounding the allegations of emotional manipulation and hear 'his side of the story'. The first thing to say is that Day does acknowledge some of his mistakes in this book for example his serial cheating and the mindset that gave rise to this. But this is done in a very cursory way - The book is peppered with his acknowledgement that he had 'hurt people' and that 'it was wrong' but much of it reads like a child explaining why they shouldn't have done something - the words are there but they lack very much insight. He attributes his cheating to a mindset laid down to him by his mother that if he kept his cheating secret and therefore didn't let his partners know that he was not hurting them and acknowledges the lies he told others and himself to maintain this mindset.

But although he admits hurting the women in his life he dwells on their perspective very little. Each girl (given highly transparent pseudonyms) has very little written about their actual personality except in their role as the object of his affections and what attracted him to them. In analysing the hurt he causes them he very rarely really considers how they may have felt in these scenarios or why they respond to him in the way that they do. They never feel like full rounded people but rather stepping stones in HIS journey to reaching realisations about his approach to relationships. A charitable view of this would be that he didn't want to fill the pages of his book with personal details of the lives of people who didn't want to be written about - But no matter how many times he argues that he is a 'love addict' who is addicted to the feeling of connection to others there is no sense that he really connects to the feelings of these women.

This is exacerbated by the way in which he paints these women's responses to his treatment of them for example Denise who despite him cheating on her twice is somehow painted as the bad guy for reading his private emails and making public statements about how his cheating and breaking up with him had made her time in London miserable, or the way in which many of his former girlfriends are painted as harpies determined to bury him when the allegations come out against him such as Crystal's hypocrisy for telling him a girl he cheated on Marilyn with was 'hot' but also condemning him for being manipulative. I do not believe ignoring people's flaws in telling a story - But as Day angrily declares in his final chapter we have a responsibility to view other people complexly, this is a luxury he never extends to the women of this story and in the final act they are painted as little more than Romans determined to stick another knife into the Neri-Caesar.

Little time in the narrative is spent on the idea of 'emotional manipulation' either. Day spends a whole chapter addressing numerous of the claims against him pointing out apparent falsehoods and railing against unfair accusations that he 'raped underage girls'. He even distances himself from his own press release in which he admitted to not having a good model of consent painting it as a sort of conspiratorial backroom press release writing session which was mostly constructed by vlogbrothers Hank and John. Despite his mission statement of writing an analysis of life online he never gets into the deeper questions within his story of the dynamic between big youtube creators and their fans and the power dynamic here - always claiming that his being a prominent personality with 1 million subscribers played no role in his pursuing and dating women he met at events. Despite passing reference to behaviour on his own part which would be classified as gas lighting he never really considers what it is to be 'emotionally manipulative' beyond a reference to taking an online sociopath test and his constant rebuttals that he ever consciously pushed women to have sex with him.

Much has been made about whether or not this book is Alex Day painting himself as a victim. There are definitely places in this book where Day admits his own faults and how badly he treated people, there are also places where he says "I brought this on myself, I must be a bad person" but these are generally followed by an email from a accuser begging him for forgiveness because they lied about him, a former girlfriend saying something unfair and libellous about him or even a Buddhist monk telling him he is a good person - Which essentially reinforce that he hasn't really done anything wrong. There is also a number of lines which boarder on Alan Partridge 'We need to talk about Alan' levels of self indulgence such as 'The internet had taken away my friends, my money and now my house' begging the question why he could not have just got a job to pay the bills that does not involve an audience of 1 million, like the rest of us - But I digress. Alex Day's narrative is ultimately one of victimhood, it is one peppered with acknowledgements of his own faults, but it is ultimately the story of someone who firmly believes they have been unfairly accused of something and have lost everything because of it.

What it lacks is the kind of astute insight and writing quality which would elevate it to something meaningful beyond a man listing his achievements, rebutting his naysayers, and bemoaning the unfairness of his fall from grace.

Christopher Hogg, 19 August 2018 https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/40714110-living-and-dying-on-the-internet

How you can be such a dickhead to think that it's a good idea to write about how you're the victim of all the harm YOU caused is beyond me.

Pangloss, 27 January 2019 https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/40714110-living-and-dying-on-the-internet

Positive

The internet + nostalgia + insights

Having watched Alex’s online life, almost from the beginning, it was incredibly interesting to hear his thoughts and experiences from this time. His writing style is much like his video style - down to earth, funny and insightful.

I really appreciate Alex opening up this sometimes painful time in his life to unpack his actions and encourage others to avoid his mistakes.

I read this in a day as I found the nostalgia and intimacy of the story addictive. So thank you Alex, for today. I hope your tomorrows are calm and happy.

Helena Golding, 5 August 2018 https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/40714110-living-and-dying-on-the-internet

This book paints a poignant and well rounded picture of the growth of YouTube as well as the growth and fall of Alex. I started and finished this book in one day it was so entrancing. This book is well written, interesting, humourous with a great voice. As I read I felt as though I was Alex's friend and he was telling me his life story just because I asked. This book made me tear up, laugh, and reminisce about the simpler times of Youtube. Alex has a gifted way with writing, he fleshes the world out so you can see it and remember how it was. Being a huge fan of british vloggers back in my teens I was familar with almost every person Alex wrote about within this book. Being able to read Alex's perspective on way things were behind the camera was fascinating and eye opening. I truly loved this book, and I think Alex is a great writer. This book also illustrates the dangers of the innocent until proven guilty culture that surrounds the internet. Truly knowing both sides of a story is the only way you can come to your own conclusions, I would encourage former fans, fangirls of Alex's supposed victims and Alex's former friends to read this book and truly consider the other side of the story.

Lacie P., 6 August 2018 https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/40714110-living-and-dying-on-the-internet

Alex Day is human.

Like all of us (I'm assuming).

His crime is having been a completely insensitive, manipulative piece of crap whilst wielding power gained through his online presence. In the book, Alex claims ignorance, his mother's unintentional influence, self-centeredness, and a complete lack of regard for consequences as would be reasons for his hurtful past behavior.

He explores his online past- showing the reader a unique look at what early YouTube was like for the early YouTuber, as well as a look into his life at the time. We read of his ambition and inspirations and that of his then friends.

Nearing the end, when the accusations begin to circulate the internet, the reader has more context to then understand the claims and the actions taken by Day and those affected.

It is clear that Day regrets hurting the people he hurt and that (at least in his mind at the time) he thought that any sexual interaction he'd had was appropriate and wanted. I also want to stress that Alex did not just conveniently regret the hurt he'd caused once it became public... it is important to note that he was striving to improve as a person before his life was set aflame by the reality of the people he manipulated and hurt (intentionally or not).

Alex does something else in this book that I'm still turning in my head... He doesn't just aim to defend himself against the specific claims he believes are either false or otherwise exaggerated, he aims to call out the very people of the internet itself for their hypocritical behavior, easily triggered mob mentality, and destruction of due process.

I know some people will read or hear about this book and belief Alex was playing the victim here... but I don't think that's the case. I think he was making an honest attempt at explaining his side of things. He was trying to make us remember he is human, one that makes mistakes like we all do.

Not a monster, but a human being that is moody and horny and sad and lost and ambitious and lonely and just... complex.

Just trying to do better.

The book is an easy addictive read.

I wish him the best in his future endeavors.

Media Squirrel, 8 August 2018 https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/40714110-living-and-dying-on-the-internet

Other

I have been nervous to write a review for this book because the Internet is a pretty scary place (as the book itself discusses). I felt nervous that writing a review would immediately give the impression that I condone abuse of any kind, or am disbelieving/discrediting or even blaming victims of abuse. This, of course, isn’t true and I hope that my review gives a fair impression of my thoughts.

As an avid YouTube viewer (in general, not necessarily of Alex Day) and someone who watches many of the people identified within this book, I enjoyed seeing the other side of YouTube. The veiled curtain was lifted and I was given a real insight into the beginnings of this now massive platform. I was gifted a glimpse into how the ‘other side’ live, and the absolutely bonkers amount of freedom, money and support that Youtubers’ were given when this platform first took off. I can only imagine the scale of this now, and I’m sure a more current book would shock me even more, in regards to money, behaviour and YouTube drama.

Regardless of the trickier subject matter (I’ll get to that later), I thought that this book was interesting, well written and had good pace. I read it within one day. I didn’t want to support Alex, in fact I actively wanted it to be a bit crap but I found myself totally engaged. I should say here that I didn’t buy the book, I read it on kindle unlimited.

Now let’s discuss the real issues here. For anyone who doesn’t know, in 2013, a series of anonymous allegations were made against Alex Day regarding sexual manipulation and alleged sexual/emotional abuse. I have read the forums, I have read the posts, I had my mind made up regarding this. Now having read the book, I still don’t know what really happened between the people involved. The only people who will ever really know are Alex Day and the girls involved. I think that’s important to say. Reading this book meant that I heard the other side of the story, but I would hate to jump to conclusions and support Day (and discredit the victims) or vice versa.

What I do think is particularly relevant from this book, is just how scary the Internet is. From giving teenagers tens of thousands of pounds to make videos, to potentially ruining someone’s life and career because of anonymous posts - it highlights just how much power the internet has, and gives people. We have a brilliantly empowering resource at our fingertips and I can’t imagine the bravery needed when people divulge abuse (online or in person) BUT equally, this guilty until proven innocent culture can also be incredibly damaging. It is very easy to believe everything you read online and immediately discredit a person... It’s a really fine line and knowing which side to stand is really hard.

Throughout the book (and from his videos), I did find myself disliking Alex. I’ll say it, I think he was (is?) arrogant, pompous and acted in some very selfish and downright horrible ways. But actually, Alex admits this throughout the book. He is quite upfront with mistakes that he made, I just hope that he actually feels remorse for the negative decisions, such as cheating etc. I hope that this book remorse isn’t just a front or a mask. It is easy to pretend to be remorseful, but again... only he will know.

So, in conclusion... Have I been manipulated by a brilliant story teller? Was this all a ploy for Alex to climb another chart and make yet more money? Or, actually was this a man telling his side of the story and being honest? I really will never know, but I enjoyed reading it none the less.

Elle, 9 August 2018 https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/40714110-living-and-dying-on-the-internet

I've been thinking about how to rate this book and ultimately decided not to. If I were to judge the writing and style overall it would probably be somewhere around 3, 3 and a half stars.

A long time ago, the author was known as Nerimon on YouTube. He was a fairly popular creator, and one of the few stars on the site at the time. I followed him for a while, back when he was doing his Alex Reads Twilight series, which I loved. Then I pretty much forgot about him until last year, when a pang of nostalgia made me look him up again. I then found out that he had been accused of cheating on his girlfriend and manipulating his fans into sleeping with him, and had been essentially ostracized from the community as a result.

This book is a memoir which describes Alex's rise to fame and subsequent downfall due to the allegations brought against him. I found the situation very unique and was interested in reading more in depth about it, which is why I was eager to get my hands on this book as soon as it came out. Alex's story paints a picture of an arrogant and immature boy who did not treat his lovers with respect and consideration on one side, and one of a struggling artist never managing to really break out into the mainstream on the other. The second half of the book is focused on the scandal that plagued Alex's career and its aftermath; he was crucified by the online community with a ferocity which I cannot fully comprehend and was renounced by all his friends and business contacts. All of this amounts to a very engaging "rise and fall" story which made me question a number of things: In the context of believing the victim, how do we handle anonymous accusations? If due process is not being followed, how do we exactly determine guilt? Are people who call Alex a sexual offender committing libel since he has not been found guilty of this crime in a court of law? I cannot pretend to have the answer to all these questions, but it is certainly interesting to think about.

I noticed that there is a trend of shaming people who read or purchase this book. I am not in the business of being ashamed or scared to read what I want to read.

Iulia, 23 August 2018 https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/40714110-living-and-dying-on-the-internet